Posted 5:05 PM by Gene

I think Le Trial Ovitz is generating a great big yawn except from business geeks and show-biz nerds precisely because we already know one central fact: SHOW-BIZ IS ORGANIZED CRIME.

Posted 5:02 PM by Gene

TRANSLATION: SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGERS ARE MORPHING INTO NEWS HACKS -- WITH ALL THE GREED AND IRRESPONSIBILITY ATTENDANT THERETO.

But then I would expect dissembling from a SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGER -- and from DOW 36,000.

Posted 4:59 PM by Gene

Well, at least we won't have to ask if Sony rigs JEOPARDY!!!!! anymore -- at least until its research department finds another golden boy.

And thank you as always, NEWS HACKS, for keeping this MEDIA-STATE SECRET.

Posted 4:51 PM by Gene

I guess the Fighting Irish should fire a coach who winds it up at the INSIGHT.COM Bowl.

Posted 1:20 PM by Gene

Another con-SER-va-tive demonstrates his ignorance so he, too, can say GRRRRRRRRRREAT!!!!!:

Running Kellogg’s for the last five years, Carlos Guttierez [typical NRO Corner SIC], the man the President nominated yesterday to become the next secretary of commerce, expanded the company’s sales by 43 percent. How?

There can’t be many big, established consumer goods companies that expanded their sales half as dramatically during the past five years. Did Guttierez [a second typical NRO Corner SIC] somehow enable Kellogg’s to steal market share from Post and Quaker Oats? Diud [a THIRD typical NRO Corner SIC] he introduce an array of new products? Or did he increase sales overseas, persuading millions of Chinese and Indians to start their mornings with Frosted Flakes?

There must be dozens of twenty-two or –three year old analysts on the island of Manhattan at this very moment who have access to Kellogg’s last few annual reports. Would one or two of you kindly drop me a line? The Rice Krispies boys, Tony the Tiger, Sam the Toucan and I all want to know how Gutierrez [WwwwwwELL! He got it RIGHT this time!] turned in such remarkable performance.

Uh, Petey, he did it principally by BUYING KEEBLER.

Posted 12:58 PM by Gene

I REPEAT, REPEATEDLY: Advertisers will propagate JUNK TELEVISION until HELL FREEZES OVER because they have the MONEY TO BURN and the PYROMANIA TO BURN IT.

Posted 12:01 PM by Gene

Another BRILLIANT idea from STERNO!!!!!!!!!!:

I repeat my advice to CBS: You should replace Dan Rather with Jon Stewart.

Yeah. BRILLIANT IDEA. He'd chase away the Polident and Depends crowd while alienating his fans, and then he'd turn SO self-serious he'd have a breakdown on the air to rival Jessica Savitch's -- or DANNO's.

HAVE ANY MORE BRILLIANT IDEAS, KING OF NEW MEDIA?

Posted 10:27 AM by Gene

Brokaw crafting a personal send-off

Friends and Fellow-Citizens:

The period for a new election of a citizen to administer the Executive Government of the United States being not far distant....

Oh wait, that ALREADY HAPPENED.

Posted 10:20 AM by Gene

OoooooooooOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooh, the INTERNATIONAL RED CROSS issues "SECRET" reports (interesting how SECRET reports become PUBLIC) charging we engage in -- TORTURE!!!!! at GITMO!!!!!!!!!!

These being mostly Europeans (and anti-Sem...shhhhhh!), they would charge ten meals a day, wall-to-wall carpeting and La-Z-Boys and DirecTV in every room as torture.

Posted 10:12 AM by Gene

SO, we can blame CIRCULATION INFLATION ON: broken-down printing presses, the dot-com bust, 9/11 (WAIT! I thought people LOVED us after that!), "CHANGING LIFESTYLES", cable, corrupt executives -- everybody but OURSELVES.

P. S. KICKBACKS....

Posted 6:56 AM by Gene

SURPRISE: The project to keep the public away from Congresspoops at the Capitol is running WELL OVER BUDGET.

Posted 6:55 AM by Gene

2,145 WORDS on the meaning of "HIP" when I've defined it in TWENTY with the NEWS HACKS' DICTIONARY: Something bad (usually pop-cultural) done by young people, and embraced by aging boomer news hacks to show they're with-it.

Posted 6:53 AM by Gene

And since America's academic-industrial complex believes in FAIRNESS, why not let EVERY college team PLAY IN A BOWL GAME?

Posted 6:51 AM by Gene

The censorship boys of academe win a Godly (er, PINCHly) victory permitting them to shut out army recruiters for you can guess the reason.

It seems odd though that these noble models of the mortarboard runway would add the First Amendment to their wardrobe given their concerted efforts to ban it. (Doubly odd that many are hiding their identities -- until you realize they're addicted to that elixir of youth called FEDERAL FUNDS.) And of course the real reason they're doing it is not gays, but GUNS -- they can't stand a man who owns one (unless, of course he's a crook).

Posted 6:31 AM by Gene

I'D LIKE TO SUBJECT THE WHOLE G000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000GLEBLOGGER STAFF TO A LIE DETECTOR TEST. THE ONLY THING THEY'D TELL THE TRUTH ABOUT IS THAT THEY'RE WORTH A LOT OF INFLATED MONEY.

[W]e will be pushing new code to both gather information on these freezes as well as revise some features to put less strain on the database.

THERE CAN ONLY BE ONE MEANING TO THIS: THEY DON'T KNOW WHEN THEY'RE BREAKING DOWN, AND TO "FIX" THE PROBLEM THEY'LL SACRIFICE FUNCTIONALITY. BUT WHO NEEDS A FIX WHEN YOU'RE HEADED TO $5,000 A SHARE?

Posted 7:26 PM by Gene

Sighhhhhhhhhhhhhh, I suppose I SHOULD be more respectful of people like Mr. Gutierrez, but why is it so many of America's head honchos are interchangeable technocrats? Besides I have NO respect for the CEOs of our leading consumer-marketing powerhouses because they spend so much of their time financing JUNK TELEVISION, and they REVEL in it. (Think how many times The Big K has run promos on its cereal boxes and you can only be convinced their biggest product line is SHOW-BIZ.) At least this guy's new job is largely ceremonial, dodging jet lag at international conferences, acting as a one-man Rotary Club for big business (but nonetheless with a strong possibility of mischief; if he's like too many of his predecessors, he can give goodly departments of the store away). He will also attend the occasional BUSINESS-and-EDUCATION conferences whose sole purpose is to see that our SKOOLS turn out more COGWHEELS for the CUBICLE MAZES, and anything else be DAMNED.

I guess I'm annoyed too because THE MOST POWERFUL POWER LINE!!!!! (besides using the inevitable annoying "Grrreat!" in recopying Dubya's words) ran a piece on one of the too many rockers to whom SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGERS spend too much of their non-blogging time listening. Honest, if they had better tastes they probably wouldn't say "GRRREAT." But then they probably wouldn't be SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGERS.

P. S. Even MARKETWATCH's tablepounders concede that despite firing blameless workers and spending half his time in Hollywood Carlos has just managed to get Kellogg's profits above 1994 levels. This, among technocrats, is an ACHIEVEMENT.

Posted 5:39 PM by Gene

Violent crime in schools cut in half over 10 years, government says

This is an accomplishment?

Schools have taken a number of steps, from installing metal detectors and hiring more security personnel to implementing programs aimed at curbing bullying, which can lead to more serious crimes.

I repeat, this is an accomplishment?

The report found students are more apt to be victims of violence outside schools.

I repeat...oh, never mind.

Posted 5:23 PM by Gene

BLAHBLAHBLAHBLAHBLAH (Or, STERNO's a WOMAN who writes for WIRED.com!):

I'm more inclined to believe that poverty, disenfranchisement, desperation, racism, child abuse, ignorance and gang mentality...

...lead to terrorism? So how do you fight terrorism? By being NICE to people?

OHHHHHHHHHHH, you're talking about POOOOOOOOORN, about those EEEEEEEEEEEEEVIL SAM BROWNBACKS who want to REGULATE EVERY PC. Well, the PORN spamsters seem to have done enough to make PCs virtually useless. I guess I can live with 1000 come-ons every day in my in-box. Can you? Can your friends' children? (From the way you type we may safely assume you have none.)

Posted 5:06 PM by Gene

Overheard today at Mickey D's:

She can sing without MUSIC?

Hey bud, you don't know music these days.

Posted 5:04 PM by Gene

No, MR. NO-SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN ZONE, there's a DIFFERENCE between passing phony memos and saying, "Hey babe, you've got nice boobs. Mind if I stimulate their erogenous zones?"

MR. NO-SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN ZONE may be challenging THE GLIBERAL as AMERICA'S MOST INSULAR, SELF-SATIRICAL, STUPIDEST PUNDIT.

Posted 4:58 PM by Gene

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOGLE
BLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOGGER'S
SLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW
AGAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIN.

Let me guess -- GOOG WENT UP TODAY!!!!!

And a big fat THANK YOU to the ZILLIONAIRE DO-NOTHINGS in MOUNTAIN VIEW for losing TWO OF MY POSTS!!!!! HOW MANY OTHER POSTS DID YOU LOSE TODAY?

Posted 11:45 AM by Gene

Dubya's chosen the price-gouging sugar-sweetening Kellogg's CEO Mr. Gutierrez as his Commerce chief.

What would you rather do -- make millions financing CRAPPY TELEVISION and boasting you know all of Hollywood, or run a bureaucracy?

I guess Dubya needed another Hispanic.

Then again...after four years at Commerce, maybe Carlos will go out and find himself another regal throne -- how does GE BANCORP sound? -- and thus emboldened his royal fits really WILL hit the fan!

P. S. Prez calls him a "visionary." TRANSLATION: He bought Keebler.

Posted 8:55 AM by Gene

Reasons They Haven’t Hit Us Again
Answering the big question.

TRANSLATION: Three pages of Idunno.

Posted 6:43 AM by Gene

If America's "news"papers couldn't run ads like this, how could they fill in the space between the ads?

It's something to consider the next time you hear of press bias, or a correction, or Hairshirt Howie or Hairshirt Shaw on another of their lengthy mea culpas, or CIRCULATION INFLATION.

P. S. We shouldn't be surprised: Hearst's been running ads in the news hole since Billy Randolph BLEW UP THE MAINE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted 6:23 AM by Gene

Raising lots of money in political campaigns is one thing. But if it is not spent wisely, it can do more harm than good.

Who says it ever does any good?

P. S. George $oro$ spent $23.4 million, which in his case qualifies as CHUMP change.

Posted 6:21 AM by Gene

Figures: in the nation's crime capitol, a local college may get the death penalty.

Posted 3:18 PM by Gene

If I were a con-SER-va-tive I wouldn't get TOO excited that Ollie's masterwork's a bomb (or as POWER LINE!!!!! would put it, a BOMB!!!!!!!!!!) because despite his many flops Ollie, like Spike Lee and Woodster the Perv, is a succès d'estime in the BIZ, and the only way he'd be stopped from making movies is if he turned -- CON-SER-VA-TIVE.

Posted 11:49 AM by Gene

Another G000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000GLE search: "synergy" -- 7,680,000 HITS.

Posted 11:36 AM by Gene

STERNO's alter ego and former fellow SYNERGIST DICK "GUNS CAUSED COLUMBINE!!!!!" CORLISS writes 5,261 TIRESOME WORDS about movie sex, and OF COURSE, being a FLAILING BURNING HACK he must NOT realize he thoroughly VOIDS his 5,261 TIRESOME WORDS with TWENTY WORDS from Mike Nichols:

"I think sex in a movie is boring," Nichols says, "just as a scene of someone eating dinner is not that interesting" [punctuational SIC]

So this is what we've come to: all that FREEDOM, all that SEX, and the topic is BORING. This is why I HATE AD-BLURB COPYWRITERS with an ASEXUAL PASSION: their OPEN-MINDED GROUPTHINK helped GET MOVIES in their CURRENT MESS -- and our SOCIETY TOO.

Posted 10:27 AM by Gene

A G000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000GLE search: "CRITICALLY-ACCLAIMED" -- 741,000 hits.

Posted 10:26 AM by Gene

If this PAPER OF RE-CORD account of Lockheed Martin is to be believed, there is no "revolving door" when government is business, and business is government.

Last graf quoting the head of this for-profit agency:

"I don't say this lightly," he said. "Our industry has contributed to a change in humankind."

It could contribute to an even bigger change if you're not careful.

Posted 9:58 AM by Gene

Which is not to say that MR. MARK ever forgets his ROOTS -- the HITLER DIARIES, Joe "Nobel Prize in Literature" Klein, etc. AS IN:

Earlier this fall, Jackson invited NEWSWEEK to be the first to visit the set of "King Kong"....

LIKE HELL. GE BANCORP SENT THE INVITE. So we should say LITTLE JEFFREY wooed your flack to the set, or Bob "Plastic Man" Wright -- or, at least figuratively speaking, PAT KINGSLEY, since she figuratively writes half the rag.

P. S. The Imagineering Goodthings folks (we should give credit to the FRENCH WATER WORKS FOLKS, since it really happened under their mismanagement) are doing this because there's a King Kong attraction at its theme park in Universal City -- a GREAT REASON TO REMAKE A REVERED PICTURE. Sounds like SIX SIGMA to me!

P. P. S. Universal didn't even make the original. RKO RADIO did.

P. P. P. S. RKO was once a joint venture run by (among others) Joe "The Fascist Fornicator" Kennedy Sr. and RCA. Guess what happened to RCA. It is not written in the Bible that GE BANCORP has to last forever.

Posted 9:47 AM by Gene

Here the GLIBERAL, writing a PUTATIVE "AHTS" column (with the accent on PU), threatens mankind with A GREAT SCOURGE OF JOCK ITCH, so what does the PUBLIC EDI-TOR of THE PAPER OF RE-CORD worry about? CULTURAL LISTINGS!!!!!

Posted 9:41 AM by Gene

WwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwELL!!!!! After MR. MARK'S MASTERPIECE, the greatest achievement in magazines since MARGARET BOURKE-WHITE'S FORT PECK DAM graced THE FIRST COVER OF HENRY LUCE'S LIFE, what can he do for an ENCORE?????

Of course -- MEMORY DRUGS!!!!!

We don't need them, MR. MARK, to remember how BAD BLUNDER's been over the years.

Posted 7:09 PM by Gene

Here's something I just found out: What did the TRIBUNE of THE PEOPLE*, one of the GREATEST COMPOSERS OF ALL TIME, A GENIUS to OUTGENIUS ALL GENIUSES, THE BOSS, get that some hack named JIMMY McHUGH never got?

Hint: it's usually spelled with an R in a CIRCLE.

*See paragraph 14.

Posted 5:44 PM by Gene

Remember when I said LALA's CRITICALLY-ACCLAIMED RENDELLTORIUM needed work because it generated so much heat people nearby had to keep their AC on all the time? WELL, LALA's GUVMENT may SANDBLAST THE WALLS, and you can imagine how much that'll cost, and if it'll work.

You can never spend too much on THE AHTS; it's a permanent cost overrun.

Posted 5:06 PM by Gene

And now, for a re-run from a year ago, slightly revised, a piece to get you in the holiday spirit, entitled:

WHY ARE POP CHRISTMAS SONGS INTOLERABLE?

The standard explanations won't do -- that the Christmas season's one long shopping spree, and the platitudes of the songs are the platitudes of corrupt businessmen; that they're overexposed and inescapable, especially now with FOREGROUND MUZAK. Certainly the notion of America enveloped in DOOM and GLOOM and ENNUI won't do; Tom Lehrer and Stan Freberg wrote their very sour takes on Christmas in the late fifties, before our favorite assassination. No, the best explanation is that the songs are FLAT-OUT BAD. Christ was born to provide fodder for Lawrence Welk. Consider that none of the truly top Broadway songwriters ever wrote a hit Christmas tune -- save Irving Berlin; the holiday perfectly fit a lyrical style that at its worst echoes a rhyming dictionary ("Where the treetops glisten,/And children listen,/Stand beside her,/And guide her," etc., etc., etc.). The songs also brought out the most crass in the record industry as it entered its fat years in the fifties, a time when Mitch Miller thought it cute to have Ol' Blue sing a duet with a dog. You can't think of Meredith Willson's utterly corny "It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas" without the cute pizzicato strings and the cute flutes and the cute xylophone and Johnny Mathis with a two-second reverb and a clothespin on his larynx. (When Willson wrote his Christmas musical Here's Love twelve years later his depleted inspiration made him re-use it, proof that the holiday does not bring out the best in musicians.) Even the very few good Christmas tunes suffer from guilt by association. Arthur Fiedler turned Leroy Anderson's "Sleigh Ride" into an exciting, bracing mini-tone poem, but everywhere else Mitchell Parish's lyrics kick in, with their fakery of farmers and pumpkin pie and Currier and Ives, and it's back to the land of hack arrangements by Ralph Carmichael and the ooohing and aaahing of the angelic chorus. "The Christmas Song" (not great, but pretty good) marks the beginning of Nat "King" Cole's transformation from a jazzman of the first rank to an automatic molasses dispenser. Elvis, who frequently performed bad songs at half-mast, was the perfect pop Christmas singer, oozing the drivel out like a particularly unctuous undertaker soothing a dead body's relative, or a relative's dead body. And let us not forget the KIDDIE TUNES written for television though it didn't yet exist, sound-alike songs like "Frosty the Snowman" (you can hear the songwriters cutting a deal on the tune) and "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer," whose title character originated at a now-defunct department-store chain (Montgomery Ward). One of the great mysteries of popular music is how Haven Gillespie and J. Fred Coots survived a piece of junk like "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" to write the immortal "You Go To My Head"; by rights their next tune should have been written by Bob Merrill. (Look up the tune in ASCAP's ACE directory and you find a veritable army of the tiresome acts that buried it: the Ames Brothers, Brenda Lee, Ray Conniff, Liberace, Guy Lombardo, the Mills Brothers -- and yes, I include Bruce.) While it is true that familiarity breeds contempt, the contempt starts early when those familiar notes in your brain are so contemptible.

Posted 4:53 PM by Gene

An article like this would normally be another liberal tantrum of powerlessness (Norm's presence -- he's the Perfesser Thompson of politics -- confirms it); but last time a party had total control of government it was kicked out of Congress a scant two years later, having sleazed over after six decades' rule. Republicans may gloat now, and they have a decided advantage in that the Dems couldn't think their way out of a hole in the ground; but given the puny achievements of total control the last time, we cannot expect much from THEM; and what is more, the Reps are doing exactly the same thing as the Dems did, and while their onanistic dream may not end soon, it can only end (and it will end -- sorry, POWER LINE!!!!!) in crashing corruption.

Posted 4:42 PM by Gene

To be sure, an article like this may just be liberals again going WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! DEY WON'T INVITE ME TO DA PAHTY! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! (the presence of Norm, the Perfesser Thompson of politics, confirms it); but lest we forget, Democrats ran the government for two years after Slick came in -- and they were out of Congress by '94, having been thoroughly sleazed over after six decades of majority rule. Con-SER-va-tives may gloat now, but given the puny achievements of total control the last time, we cannot expect much from THEM; and what is more, the Reps are doing exactly what the Dems did, and while their onanistic dream may not end soon -- the Dems couldn't think their way out of a hole in the ground -- it can only end (as it will end -- sorry, POWERLINE!!!!!) in crashing corruption.

Posted 1:12 PM by Gene

I know people like POWER LINE!!!!!!!!!!!! and GENERAL have been yelling about Ukraine, and I'm not sure why; it's all about who oversees a third-rate country and a fourth-rate economy -- and the rotting carcass of Chernobyl.

Posted 12:36 PM by Gene

And thank you as ALWAYS, G000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000GLEBLOGGER, for forcing me to correct the time on all posts between noon and 1 p.m.!

Posted 12:25 PM by Gene

Happily cities have their RENDELL ZONES (USAOKAY!!!!!!!!!! calls them "art districts") with lots of little bistros and lots of used book stores and lots of QUIRKY clothiers, and a few jazz "clubs" where nobodies play, and which together do as much business as two or three small stores in a BIG suburban mall.

Posted 12:19 PM by Gene

Another irksome NEWS HACK tradition, and more stories they can write in their sleep: how this year's $MA$ sales will beat last year's. This year's $MA$ sales ALWAYS beat last year's -- and then, after the holiday, we find they DIDN'T beat them. I hate these stories in no small way because they remind us that 99 percent of retail sales occur in suburban malls, the malls that destroyed downtowns, the malls that did so much to make $MA$ a month-long pestilence.

Posted 12:04 PM by Gene

In the old days men came from off the street to write musicals, and we'll sing the results forever. Now they go to WORKSHOPS, workshops sponsored by BMI (which does NOT stand for Bowel Movements Inc., though given the music it represents, it should), and the results include "A Chorus Line, Nine, Little Shop of Horrors and Urinetown" -- and that immortal hit with PUPPETS, Avenue Q.

QUICK! Hum me a tune!

Posted 9:25 AM by Gene

You auditioning again, STERNO??????????

HA HA HA, they only saw you on the LEFT COAST 'cause of FOOTBALL! HA HA HA!! Ah, the perils of being the THOMAS PAIN [SIC] of our time.

Posted 9:22 AM by Gene

Oh oh, MORTIMER ZUCK IS EXCITED AGAIN! Better take your MEDS, Mort! DOUBLE them!

Posted 9:04 AM by Gene

PINCHspeak: HEROES challenge TRADITIONS.

TRANSLATION: WE'LL DO WHAT IT TAKES TO GIVE OUR MORTAL ENEMIES HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE!!!!!

Calllllllllling Puuuuuuuublic EEEEEEEEEEEEDITORRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!

Posted 8:57 AM by Gene

Dying Protestant social clubs try to convince America it's possible to be saintly AND Democratic.

And Glen (being one of the Lord God PINCH's good little boys) tries to help them along by insisting poverty, "the death penalty [and] broader moral questions such as responding to the world AIDS epidemic and a US economy increasingly reliant on low-wage labor from abroad" are "moral issues." TRANSLATION: Their moral issues AREN'T OURS.

Posted 8:52 AM by Gene

"The Father of Pakistan" (or whatever they called this nuclear-blackmailing crook) makes the Mafia look like Boy Scouts.

Posted 8:04 PM by Gene

One of the GREATEST MUSICAL MASTERWORKS OF ALL TIME -- and THE KIDS DIDN'T GET PAID A DIME FOR IT!!!!!

I'd say they ran into the MUSIC BIZ.

P. S.

CLASSIC: 1. Something pop-cultural that we like that's been around for a LONG TIME -- like twenty years.

Posted 6:32 PM by Gene

It is definitely in the $MA$ spirit to put up huge glary $MA$ displays, and to ignore that huge glary $MA$ displays are not a few gifts under a tree, and then to fight over the consequences with lawyers and papers, and to be pouty on both sides.

Posted 5:57 PM by Gene

Sickness or no, should the Nine Fingers in the Wind emulate the Kremlin?

Posted 4:46 PM by Gene

DOOT DO DOOT DOOOOOOOO DO DOOOT DOOOOOOOOOO DOOT DO DOOT FLASH!!!!! IRAN CLOSE TO MAKING ANOTHER PROMISE IT WON'T BUILD NUKES!!!!!

Posted 4:05 PM by Gene

NEUHARTHISM OF A DIFFERENT KIND: I've come to detest $MA$ for many reasons, but clearly this movement (if it is such) to slough off the worst of what "the holidays" stand for (if they stand for anything) is a LEFT-WING thing ("Adbusters...eco-friendly...the effect of cosumerism on the mental health of children"), which the RIGHT-WING can answer with the only solution it knows: GREED.

Posted 4:03 PM by Gene

The British shoot back at French ridicule of their TEETH by accusing them of making the SMELLIEST CHEESE.

Well, it beats WAR -- barely.

Posted 11:47 AM by Gene

"It's easy in this environment," Maleeny said, "to suddenly cross a line from being inviting and intriguing to being intrusive and obnoxious."

Unfortunately advertising is by its very nature intrusive and obnoxious, and anyone who's staked a claim with the sugar daddies of show-biz has staked a claim to be considered intrusive and obnoxious.

Posted 9:17 AM by Gene

A. O. with B. O. gasses about how the film biz is making so much product for kids. This begs the question as for decades THE CONSPIRACY has made practically all its product for kids, many of them grown-up. And we know what the alternative to kiddie movies is: BISKINDISM, the efflorescence of the SUPER-PLATINUM age of the late sixties and seventies, when the screen was filled with CRITICALLY-ACCLAIMED doom-and-gloomy ennui from ARTISTES, whose presence was a big factor in making sure subsequent movies would be aimed at NOBODY BUT KIDS.

Posted 9:10 AM by Gene

Remember that fool cancer doctor who forced a dying George Harrison to scribble his name on a GHEE-tar that could have sold for $550 quadrazillion on eBay? Well, he's back in the news because some equally fool judge ruling in a wrongful-death case involving him had to issue an opinion in VERSE -- BEATLE-VERSE.

Maybe he hoped he could sell IT on eBay.

Posted 9:01 AM by Gene

The jug-eared deserting fool can go "home."

It's just as well; years of spending ten hours a day studying the Great Leader's thoughts is punishment enough.

Posted 8:46 AM by Gene

The nice thing about wireless appliances is that hackers will have even more things to tamper with.

And one suspects when they get hacked, they stay hacked.

Posted 4:27 PM by Gene

I argue for research not because I intend to do it any more - my name on a research project causes priests immediately to reject the findings....

Maybe, Mr. Greeley, if you wrote a NOVEL -- no? I guess the staid ol' Catholic Church will have to try to change without you.

Posted 3:48 PM by Gene

NO FURTHER COMMENT:

Inmate to seek Arafat's job

Posted 1:00 PM by Gene

You scratch your head and think, why, of all history's heroes, hasn't Olly Stone made a move about HIM?

Or Kim-Il Sung.

Posted 9:29 AM by Gene

What compels people to get up at 8 a.m. on a dank, dark, blustery day, a day they can sleep until noon, to watch a bunch of people tugging at some rubbery balloons?

Posted 9:08 AM by Gene

Sites like POWER LINE!!!!!!!!!!!! can be next to useless because they always rely on the same three sources: The Wall Street Journals Conservative Edition (and especially the FREELOADERS' REVIEW), The Washington Times, THE NEW YORK POST!!!!!!!!!!, plus some very like-minded bloggers. As Dick Gephardt's nomination for vice president and EXIT POLLS have proved, these sources have -- problems. I try to keep my options open, but even then there's no way of knowing what's out on the Web, and I always bang my head on the keyboard thinking I'm missing some sites of real value. But I do know when a SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGER finds something he touts as TERRIFIC!!!!!, you can be sure it's just a political version of AIN'T IT COOL NEWS.

Posted 9:06 AM by Gene

Bin Laden Not Hiding on Pakistan Border - Commander

As usual, they have not a clue.

Posted 8:59 AM by Gene

You'd think on Thanksgiving THE GLIBERAL would give his anger and his health a day off, and eat a little turkey. But no, he has to give everyone, as usual, THE BIRD.

You wonder when reality will touch the Lord God PINCH. Perhaps the GLIBERALS and Doody Dowds get the TRUE BELIEVERS of Midtown Manhattan going, but elsewhere they're figures of uproarious laughter, even one guesses among some liberals, and each time the Lord God PINCH gives space for their left-wing John Birching it's another chunk out of His Kingdom's reputation.

Posted 7:48 PM by Gene

PAPER OF RE-CORD Freudian Slip of the Day:

Set perpendicular to the river, the library looks comparatively slick.

Posted 4:55 PM by Gene

And on this day Ricky Duhhh decides he can't pay the grocer with weeds, and two stupid comedians announce an unearthing to the wail of a godawful pun, here's another reason the EH?landers deserve to wallow in self-pity:

The number of Canadians who say they have smoked pot in the past year has nearly doubled in a decade, a major new study on addiction says.

More than 44 per cent of Canadians say they have used marijuana at least once in their lifetime, a figure that spiked to 70 per cent among 18 to 24-year-olds, the Canadian Addiction Survey says.

And more than 14 per cent of all of the survey's respondents reported using the drug in the past year — up from 7.4 per cent in 1994.

But there is good news:

The prevalence of pot use increased with education and income, according to the survey.

So our friends to the north are at least getting stoned on purpose. EH?

Posted 1:58 PM by Gene

VIACON's new media darling, TOM FRESTON (remember the name), has just appointed an EXECUTIVE VICE-PRESIDENT OF RESEARCH (whose very INAPT name is FRANK), which means the outfit will FOCUS-GROUP and NUMBER-CRUNCH EVERYTHING, which means, with any luck, SUMNER'S WINNING STREAK CONTINUES.

Posted 1:55 PM by Gene

Hey STERNO! What caused this latest masterwork of teen crime? The tooth fairy?

Posted 1:10 PM by Gene

A 72-year-old great-grandmother is preparing for deployment to the war zone in Iraq and will become one of the oldest Department of Defense civilian workers in the war zone.

"I volunteered," said Lena Haddix of Lawton, who has five children, eight grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. "I wanted to do something for the country, because I was always left behind taking care of the children."

GO GREAT-GRANNY!

Posted 1:01 PM by Gene

Cheech, Chong to make joint appearance

Given Ricky Duhhh, I don't think this headline's funny. Knowing VNU, I don't think it's intentional either.

Posted 11:54 AM by Gene

SHUCKS, the ultra-right-wing CHR...Orthodox Jews in Israel are just as CLOSED-MINDED AND PROVINCIAL as the MORONS WHO voted in a RETA...who watch DESPERA...oh, forget it.

Posted 11:52 AM by Gene

Hup...2...3...SIGN!

Caveat: it's David Hackworth.

Posted 11:39 AM by Gene

Duhhhhhhhhhhh, forced to choose between pot and, duhhhhhhh, money, I choose, duhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh...

money.

Posted 10:16 AM by Gene

One of the world's immortal heroes is facing a roman à clef over his heroism. Amazing about NEWS HACKS and HEF -- they castigate him for all the wrong reasons (feminism, sexism, etc. etc. etc.) but they have obits ready to defrost that will paint him as the man who led the human race to FREEDOM (never mind STDs, Dorothy Stratten, etc. etc. etc.). As I've said though, THE NEWS HACKS' HEROES are ALWAYS SOBs, they being SOBs THEMSELVES.

Posted 9:23 AM by Gene

NEWSMAX: RATED NUMBER ONE WASTE OF READERS' TIME!!!!!!!!!!

After watching Friday night's beating handed out by Indiana Pacers' Ron Artest upon several unsuspecting fans during a Detroit Pistons vs. Indiana Pacers basketball game, the Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson, founder and president of BOND (Brotherhood Organization of a New Destiny)....

Don't these clowns realize they're as much megaphones as THE PAPER OF RE-CORD is for its Je$$e? The last thing we want from NEWS HACKS is RUDY VALLEE.

Posted 6:53 AM by Gene

Hey POWER, you think you'd have half as much if USAOKAY!!!!! didn't print your name?

Posted 6:49 AM by Gene

Because movie-ad-blurb copywriters love to see their names in print HARVEY WHINER gets a piece of metal which he can now use to up the deciBels in his tirades.

Posted 6:29 AM by Gene

"What Artest did didn't surprise anyone," said Dean Bonham, a sports biz consultant. "The issue for corporate America is how risky is the endorsement of an athlete?"

Not risky enough for execs to stop wasting zillions on stupid deals that sell nothing while screaming to their flunkies, as they always will, "I KNOW THAT GUY AND YOU DON'T!!!!!"

Posted 5:19 PM by Gene

Finally, nearly THIRTY YEARS after the WALDHEIM DOCTRINE, the League of Nations condemns -- ANTI-SEMITISM??????????

Note who put it online -- conservative and Israeli news sites. Maybe as news it isn't important, but still this yells out the liberal's (and the NEWS HACK'S) tacit acceptance of Jew-baiting.

Posted 3:33 PM by Gene

Sounds like Danno's warding off a firing.

Not that he has to worry. Much.

P. S. POWER LINE!!!!! takes the appropriate credit:

RATHER RELIEVED!!!!!!!!

NO HE WAS NOT, and there is no evidence yet that he was. Knowing Danno he thinks he's going out with the crowd cheering. Knowing VIACON, so does IT.

THIS is why people complain -- sorry STERNO!!!!!, they're RIGHT to complain -- about the CREDIBILITY OF BLOGGERS.

Nor am I sure, though the organizations they front be obsolete, though serious news consumers no longer watch them except perhaps to measure the CW, that the passing of THE THREE STOOGES marks the end of the nightly network news. Twenty million still tune in -- more than listen to RUSH -- or HOWARD -- or the NO-SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN ZONE -- or even MICHAEL MEDVED.

NEWSMAX!!!!!!!!!!!! TAKES CREDIT TOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

P. P. S. Well, I guess there IS a crowd cheering.

Posted 11:59 AM by Gene

It HAD to happen: L'Affaire Kingsley is this year's screener mess.

EARTH TO HOLLYWOOD: GET A LIFE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted 10:24 AM by Gene

SOMEBODY get Nicolas Cage's new wife, Alice, an American history book — and quick! Spies at the L.A. premiere of "National Treasure" last week said Alice, 20, seemed befuddled when someone talked to her about the Declaration of Independence. "She looked at them and said, 'What is the Declaration of Independence?' " our witness relates — an account confirmed by another attendee. Cage, 40, quickly came to the rescue and said, "I'm sorry — please don't ask my wife any history questions." Another source said, "Nic is so odd — a day before he married Alice, he was asking friends for advice because he didn't want to go through with the wedding. He just can't be alone." Cage and Alice met on Valentine's Day at a sushi joint where she was a waitress, and just six months later tied the knot. Annett Wolff, Cage's representative, said: "I am sure Alice knows about the Declaration of Independence and they could not be more in love or happy."

Craig Askew! Meet Mrs. Nicolas Cage!

Posted 10:13 AM by Gene

NEUHARTHISM OF THE WEEK:

Are we in the golden age of video gaming? (Can you hear THE VOICE OF AL screaming, WE ARE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!?)

OR:

"If games were movies, we (have) Star Wars, Titanic, Toy Story, Casablanca and Gone With the Wind all (hitting) at the same time," says John Davison, editorial director for Ziff-Davis video game publications.

Star Wars, Titanic, Toy Story...That should be enough.

JOHN! You looking for a job at GanNETt? They'd LOVE to have you!

OR:

More than a few of the 1.5 million who put down a deposit for [Halo 2] months in advance took days off work to play it.

It was well worth it to Craig Askew [SIC], 33, of Henderson, N.C., who has been waiting for Halo 2 since he finished the original three years ago. He played more than 25 hours the first week the game was out, including most of Wednesday, a day he had arranged to take off from his truck-driving job. Last week, he put in another 10 hours, plus more than 12 on Sunday.

Askew says he didn't specify why he needed the time off. Taking a day off work "to spend some time playing Halo 2 is very unusual for me. The quality of this game is second to none. My HDTV and I have never been this happy playing games." [We're so GLAD you're in love, Craig.]

Others simply called in sick.

TRANSLATION: GET A LIFE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted 8:54 AM by Gene

Terrorism czars, drug-enforcement czars, copyright czars -- I got an idea: LET'S TURN THE WHOLE GOVERNMENT OVER TO A CZAR!

Posted 8:52 AM by Gene

Study: 60% of TV shows set in Calif., N.Y.

Who says show-biz is elitist?

P. S. This study was commissioned by ADVERTISERS, meaning lots of advertising vice-presidents get to pinch themselves.

Posted 8:50 AM by Gene

A shortening list of failing schools

TRANSLATION: Grade inflation.

Posted 8:48 AM by Gene

Our next PC obsession: Israel has an "Abu Ghraib!"

News hacks can gloat for months.

Posted 8:35 AM by Gene

It is inconceivable sports owners would be so cynical, so devoid of humanity, as to risk their livelihoods by condoning criminal behavior, but as I've said, RUPERT!!!!!!!!!!!! and SUMNER would gladly revive the ancient Roman gladiator games given the chance, and it is easy enough for the sports cretins to "act outraged," especially given their past outrages on taxpayers.

Americans have supplemented the empty head with the hollow heart.

Posted 8:30 AM by Gene

In an especially creative variation of QUAGMIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!, some Norwegian social number players decide the rate of "malnutrition" in Iraqi children has gone up -- from before the invasion.

You don't suppose these are the same types who would have gnashed their teeth over TV scenes of suffering from Saddam? I thought that's why the League of Nations instituted the -- forget it.

One thing's clear: CURLEY'S (Nyuk! Nyuk! Nyuk!) STOOGES will give more play to this "study" than to Kofi's prize-winning scandal.

Posted 5:50 PM by Gene

I guess we are supposed to thank the Congresspoops for deciding not to make it illegal to skip commercials.

And what DOES this have to do with BOXING except being another self-inflicted blow to the head?

Posted 5:33 PM by Gene

Citigroup Sells Truck Finance Unit to GE for $4.4 Bln

I want someone to tell me Little Jeffrey's fantasy kingdom isn't already a BANK.

Posted 5:11 PM by Gene

LA's Cardinal Mahony to be deposed in clergy abuse cases

This should be fun. Will he be as corporate and tone-deaf as MR. Law?

Posted 4:54 PM by Gene

Vilsack Won't Seek Chairmanship of DNC

Does anybody want this job?

Posted 2:21 PM by Gene

ROMY does it again:

Claim: WSJ has been neutered as a good source of war info
New York Review of Books via MotherJones.com

How about:
Fox News a superior source of war info
National Review via TownHall.com

Posted 9:48 AM by Gene

OH oh, a few SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGERS may be moving the RICHTER SCALE:

[R]ather than flog the bloggers for rushing to publish the raw exit poll data on their Web sites, we may owe them a debt of gratitude. A few more presidential elections like this one and the public will learn to do the right thing and simply ignore news of early exit poll data. Then perhaps people will start ignoring the bloggers, who proved once more that their spectacular lack of judgment is matched only by their abundant arrogance.

The problem is, ARROGANCE is something you might associate with people who've CURED CANCER!!!!!

P. S. FROM STERNO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:

: My sneaky friend Nick Denton nominated me to join Jason Calicanis in setting up a Blog Ethics Committee.

The first thing it should propose, let's ban ANY BLOGGER who criticizes HOWARD!!!!!

P. P. S. I hadn't noticed this post came just after another mention of ARROGANCE, but to the degree SUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGERS ape NEWS HACKS, so they ape their ARROGANCE.

Posted 9:40 AM by Gene

NO FURTHER COMMENT NEEDED:

[I]t seems reasonable for abortion opponents or gun owners to assume that newsrooms full of pro-choice Second Amendment-haters haven't been and won't ever be fair. Yet newsrooms, from the New York Times down, reject that argument, too.

At least one speaker at the editors' conference thought this argument was reasonable.

The Times' ombudsman.

At a Friday panel discussion, I asked Times Public Editor Daniel Okrent whether he thought it was a problem that polls showed reporters and editors are overwhelmingly Democrats and liberals. Sure, he said -- "We have to have intellectual diversity."

Unfortunately, Okrent wasn't around when [Chris] Hedges vented. But Okrent may have had Hedges (and Hedges' bosses) in mind at another point in his remarks.

"Arrogance has gone off the charts at the Times more than any other place," he said.

No kidding.

Posted 9:28 AM by Gene

Some insurgents have feigned surrender to lure marines into danger.

You don't suppose this could be behind our latest ATROCITY, could you?

Posted 9:23 AM by Gene

• Herbert: Don't Say 'Poverty'

Say RACISM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted 6:53 AM by Gene

Arlen O'Specter is "scared" -- and this is BOB NOVAK talking.

Posted 6:50 AM by Gene

The hacks are no doubt pointpointpointing to this story as proof RED-COUNTRY TYPES ARE A BUNCH OF MURDEROUS HOTHEADS.

If I'm not mistaken, HACKS, Wisconsin went for KERRY. Which proves what?

Posted 6:37 AM by Gene

The MENSA MAN, under prodding from PINCH, tries to prove Americans (and especially RED-COUNTRY AMERICANS) are hypocrites (count on STERNO!!!!!!!!!! to seize on this); but I've a hunch the TV audience is as typical of America as the moviegoing crowd, and when people use their sets as night lights, a night light will watch ANYTHING.

Typical PINCH smirk:

In the greater Atlanta market, reaching more than two million households, "Desperate Housewives" is the top-rated show. Nearly 58 percent of the voters in those counties voted for President Bush.

The last I saw this MEGAHIT drew THIRTEEN PERCENT of total households, meaning EIGHTY-SEVEN PERCENT WEREN'T WATCHING IT, and I suspect that's as true for Atlanta as anywhere else.

We may also ponder that for the last ratings period only FIFTEEN shows had more than a TEN, and that at any given time a goodly number of TVs are OFF.

Posted 6:29 AM by Gene

Does the world need a two-millionth Bible translation?

"I began this translation as a kind of dubious experiment...."

Those words will ring truer than anything in this LATEST one.

Posted 7:20 PM by Gene

NBA suspends Artest for rest of season
Jackson penalized 30 games, O'Neal 25 for roles in melee with fans

Let's see if this survives a COURT CHALLENGE.

I am NOT kidding.

Posted 6:04 PM by Gene

Why is it people who HATE classical music because it's "depressing" pound their ears with a barrage of gloomy rock tunes in a minor key?

Posted 6:01 PM by Gene

The not-infrequent accounts of "elite-school" mismanagement should make us ponder just how elite they are.

Posted 10:36 AM by Gene

Here's a story, LITTLE, that indicates the British weakness for a nip may be a bit more than a STEREOTYPE.

Posted 10:12 AM by Gene

One last item on BLUNDER and then I PROMISE I'll let it go for the day:

...How is it working with the media today, given the proliferation of gossip columnists, entertainment shows and publications?

Well there's good news and bad news. The good news is that there are so many places to go if you have work you want to publicize, because that's what we do, we publicize the work.

The other side is that it's so competitive among the media....

Indeed -- because they're so eager to help you PUBLICIZE the WORK.

Posted 9:56 AM by Gene

Here's something I wish would shut NEWS HACKS up: a front page from THE PAPER OF RE-CORD from 1962 that appears in a book I have. Here were the top headlines:

Common Market and British Voice Hopes in Impasse

President Names Dean at Columbia to Post on A. E. C.

City Acts to Pay Its Bills Faster

Who remembers these stories? Do they have any significance now? Where are the fool Jonny Alters and Gliberals to debate them? Well, there was one front-page hed to remember:

Marilyn Monroe Dead, Pills Near

And no, Jonny, this does NOT prove PAT and MR. MARK were RIGHT in COLLABORATING, for even THE PAPER OF RE-CORD (in an un-bylined "special") had to admit MM was one of the all-timers, and your and your boss's synergistic gushing will go down the rat hole like Common Market impasses, Columbia deans and New York City bills.

Posted 9:50 AM by Gene

What did you do in the war, GLIBERAL?

OR:

Thank GOD for my DEFERMENT.

Posted 9:35 AM by Gene

WAIT!!!!! Someone will have to tell the HORSE-RACING BIZ to come up with something better than the SUPERFECTA -- because HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEERE'S JONNY!!!!!

But if only a tiny number are highly offended by raunchy TV, millions are mildly or somewhat offended. And those millions vote. They want to know that the president is on their side in the ever-worsening battle between parents and popular culture for the attention of their children.

So what do we do? We turn our pages over to PAT KINGSLEY!!!!!

STERNO!!!!! will NEVER stop boasting now.

Posted 9:24 AM by Gene

And then we hit the SUPER with QUAGMIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

MR. MARK, THIS issue ought to win YOU a PRIZE -- a BOOBY PRIZE. ONCE AGAIN you prove BLUNDER is AMERICA'S SECOND-MOST RISIBLE RECYCLABLE AFTER THE PAPER OF RE-CORD.

WILL SOMEBODY TELL HIM ST. WARREN MAKES A GOODLY CHUNK OF HIS MONEY FROM THIS COMPANY OFF SATs? THAT should say something of its USEFULNESS.

OR:

News Sources People Use Most Often
Survey Question: Which (news) sources are you using more often?



Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, ’’Media Attitudes/ Youth Engagement/ Religion After 9/11’’ Nov. 13 - 19, 2001 [That's what it says there.]

I admit the chart sort-of cheats but the gist is understandable.


P. S. MR. MARK, does this explain all those funny-looking brass elephants you have on your desk?

P. P. S. In the last three years BLUNDER claims to have won 231 AWARDS, which pretty well indicates how useful THEY are.

Posted 9:21 AM by Gene

And MR. MARK pulls the TRIFECTA by running the kind of Auletta-like insider baseball about HITLER and STALIN that allows NEWS HACKS not to take any responsibility for the CRAP they help to sell by providing it a sheen of BUSINESS RESPECTABILITY.

Posted 9:19 AM by Gene

And a KINGSLEYAN RAH-RAH for SATELLITE RADIO from the SAME MORONS who thought HOWARD'S TEEMING MILLIONS would WIN THE ELECTION FOR KERRY!

TRANSLATION: HOWARD is THE DONALD of RADIO.

Posted 9:16 AM by Gene

As MR. MARK knows, PATRIOTISM is letting PAT KINGSLEY WRITE THE WHOLE DAMN RAG! WHAT'S GOOD FOR TIME W...oh, never mind.

Posted 9:12 AM by Gene

Have you ever noticed most press rele -- "news stories" about the cable industry quote executives and salesm -- ANALYSTS? And they always go OOOH and AAAH over this scheme and the next. And they never quote the victims of these synergistic technology-accreting sprees -- their RATE PAYERS. No, NEWS HACKS are as much to blame for $5000-a-month cable bills as anyone, because they give the all-important shove of the elbow.

Posted 8:59 PM by Gene

INSULTING FRENCH PHOTO CAPTION OF THE DAY!!!!!!!!!!

I had hoped to be finished for the night, but Agence France Presse acts on LITTLE much as GENERAL JR. acts on STERNO!!!!!, so....

A British hooligan in the streets of Belgium. The typical Briton is polite, witty and phlegmatic, but lacks a certain style and has a dental hygiene issue while having an occasional drinking problem (AFP/EPA/File)

This caption may be INSULTING!!!!!!!!!!!! and UNBELIEVABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!, but it also contains the kernel of truth. That LITTLE may hate the French doesn't mean we could not respond in kind to their arrogance, their rudeness, their venality, their willingness to climb in bed with villains, but occasionally even the INSULTING!!!!!!!!!! stereotype from an ENEMY has the faint whiff of verisimilitude.

Which gets me to thinking what kind of music SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGERS love -- pretentious album rock and AH'M PRAAYOUD T' BEEEEEE A CAAAAAAYN...AMERICAAAAAAYN!

P. S.

If any doubt existed of Greenwood’s “forever imprint” on America, it was dispelled in 2003—the 20 year anniversary of its release—when “God Bless The USA” was voted online by Americans as the “most recognizable patriotic song” in the nation. The song that Lee Greenwood wrote bested competition that included “God Bless America” and the “National Anthem” as a modern national anthem of the common man. [Emphasis added.]

"God Bless America" is a third-rate song with club-footed lyrics that became beloved only because the beloved Kate Smith sang it; "the 'National Anthem'" (as this semi-literate publicist calls it) is a barroom ballad about a man named Jose that no one knows how to sing. That doesn't make your song the BEE'S KNEES, Lee.

Posted 8:40 PM by Gene

The day I hear Lambert, Hendricks and Ross on foreground muzak is the day our nation goes to hell. People who can stuff their ears with Billy Joel or Ms. Elton John or the latest [C]RAP GENIUS are unworthy of them. No, let their inspiration be something for us initiates to know, and for the unlettered word to have to find out.

Posted 1:52 PM by Gene

"What we do in the entertainment business is not just go to the Hollywood parties and schmooze, but also understand what real entertainment is."

I disagree slightly, MICKEYMOUSE NIXON: what you do in the entertainment business is not just go to the Hollywood parties and schmooze, but also whack your customers on the head like mules.

Posted 9:41 AM by Gene

ABC breaks off negotiations with BCS

Who rigs the game now?

Posted 9:39 AM by Gene

I'm of two minds about this: it is probably not called for to be sending out Bible verses in government e-mails; on the other hand, the Air Force Academy has turned HYPER PC after its myriad scandals, and the last thing we expect from ANY government agency is COMMON SENSE.

Posted 9:37 AM by Gene

Ellen Goodwomyn once again redefines THE LAST THING ONE WANTS TO READ.

Posted 9:30 AM by Gene

Between SNIDELY WHIPLASH's fundraising and MSSSSSSSSSSSS. PELOSI's demagoguery, there doesn't seem much of a choice.

Posted 8:58 AM by Gene

However conscientious its scribblers may be, if there's one word to describe the secular PAPER OF RE-CORD reporting on Billy Graham, it's "disconnect." He and his flock may as well be from a distant galaxy -- likewise the other way, I'm sure.

I think little of the "Rev." Graham -- a compromiser, friend of Tricky Dick, toady to BREZHNEV -- but THE PAPER OF RE-CORD will think little of him for one reason: HIS FOLLOWERS BELIEVE IN A DIFFERENT GOD.

Posted 8:56 AM by Gene

Someone was making up for the lack of riots after the finals.

I was about to add, "Isn't it fun to have the NBA, MICKEYMOUSE NIXON?" but he'd probably lie.

Posted 5:45 PM by Gene

Maloney on Medved

For a second I thought it read "Baloney on Medved."

Posted 5:40 PM by Gene

Finally -- a just end to the long, weird story of THE BODY HOARDER.

Posted 5:38 PM by Gene

I don't know; while in jail this guy'd better cut a DEAL -- or a RECORD.

Posted 5:20 PM by Gene

Gannett to Buy HomeTown Communications

It's been doing it for YEARS.

Posted 5:13 PM by Gene

I went to Playbill.com to search for another risible hed only to encounter the sad news that the jazzman turned Broadway songwriter Cy Coleman has died. His best work was in the sixties, with Little Me (a sort-of cult show with a small charming score and Neil Simon's first musical book -- and Sid Caesar) and Sweet Charity, which had melodies plaintive and boisterous (and another Neil Simon book -- and Gwen Verdon). After those he imitated himself and others, with cutesy-pie stuff like I Love My Wife (typically seventies show about wife swapping) and the vastly overpraised City of Angels and The Will Rogers Follies, each two hours of musical filler. He'll inevitably be best known for the ultimate gimmick tune, "Witchcraft" -- a gimmick in that Blue and Elvis duetted on it. He was hardly the most inspired of musickers, but those early scores are quite entertaining, and will likely outlive anything from our shrivelled time.

Posted 5:09 PM by Gene

I notice occasionally Toenail.com trots out a serif font for heds, which suggests even they may be getting wise that their SANS-SERIF font is suitable for DerSturmer.com.

Posted 5:06 PM by Gene

Can you imagine Michael Moore or Ted Rall in their seventies?

Posted 2:09 PM by Gene

FLASH! AL HUNT GOO$E$TEP$ TO THE BLOOMY!!!!!

Now if he could get JOHN FUND TO JOIN HIM we could call it THE BLOOMIES!

Posted 1:42 PM by Gene

People tell the TRUTH to LARRY KING?!?!?!?!?

I wouldn't expect MICKEYMOUSE NIXON to tell the truth to ST. PETER.

Posted 11:58 AM by Gene

Old NEWS HACKS never die -- they just become perfessers and write stupid op-ed pieces.

Okay Ken, let TOM run for president. One problem -- you describe a STEALTH candidate. At some point he'd have to stand for something more than THE GREATEST GENERATION and his good looks. What party would he join? (We can guess.) What political philosophy would he espouse? (We can guess.) Sorry Ken, we have ENOUGH empty suits in government.

Posted 11:52 AM by Gene

I guess this is the next NEWS HACK fight -- against CHRISSSSSSSSSSTIAN ANTI-PORN CRUSADERS. (STERNO goes PSYCHO just thinking about these CULTURAL JIHADISTS.) The problem is we're not talking HOWARD'S EENIE-WEENIE-PEENIE JOKES. I don't want to think how VILE some Web porn is. Why can't we fight it?

Posted 9:40 AM by Gene

THIS WWWHHHAR IS TEARRRRING US APART!! THAT'S WHY KARL RRROVE MADE THAT TAPE -- TO JUSTIFY IT!!! HE PUT OSAMA ON THE CIA PAYROLL TO WIN BUSH THE ELECTION!!!!!

I was going to joke about senile dementia, but I decided not to. It's no joke. WWWWHHHALTER isn't very funny either.

Posted 6:59 AM by Gene

NEUHARTHISM OF THE YEAR-- WITH FOUR REPORTERS!!!!!

USAOKAY!!!!! devoted ITS vast resources to SMOKING OUT OSAMA TOO.

KENNY'S excuse: "Part of USA Today's tradition is reporting light stories on the lighter side of life."

KENNY, next time PAT KINGSLEY writes you a press release, use HER BYLINE!!!!!

Posted 6:47 AM by Gene

God knows what OSAMAs are out there, so HOLIER-THAN-THOU MORTIMER ZUCK regales his readers with this exceptionally upsetting story. WHAT PURPOSE DOES MORT ZUCK SERVE BY RUNNING THIS? WHY DO WE HAVE TO KNOW EVERY DEVASTATING PRIVATE TRAGEDY THAT COMES DOWN THE BLOCK? DOES IT REALLY HELP YOUR INFLATED CIRCULATION, ZUCK?????

YOU SENT THREE REPORTERS ON THIS, ZUCK -- THREE MORE THAN YOU NO DOUBT SENT ON OSAMA BEFORE HE DESTROYED THE WTC AND KILLED 2,700 PEOPLE.

ZUCK'S EXCUSE: "Well, um, uh, such stories create COMPASSION for the VICTIMS of these HORRIBLE CRIMES."

Um, ZUCK, have you ever heard of COMPASSION FATIGUE?

ZUCK'S MORE LIKELY EXCUSE: "Haven't seen the paper." (Operative 12:00:01 a.m. Sunday to 11:59:59 Saturday.)

Posted 6:42 AM by Gene

The Evil Sorceress of PR, a monster who writes whole swaths of publications like USAOKAY!!!!! and PEOPLE (and the LALATIMES), is getting BAD PUBLICITY.

REWRITE!!!!! Pffh-hh-hh!

Posted 6:37 AM by Gene

The Spanish bury their heads in the sand over terrorism -- and unearth them long enough to yell racial slurs.

CLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCK
CLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCKCLUCK!!!!!

Posted 7:04 PM by Gene

Small Screen DVDs Generate Big Profits

Old Movies, New Profits

TRANSLATION: The movie studios can now price-gouge the way the record labels do.

Posted 5:10 PM by Gene

Despite the best tantrums, Arlen O'Specter tam-o'-shanters his way to a chairmanship.

Time to put on that SHORT INVISIBLE LEASH.

Posted 5:00 PM by Gene

STERNO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YOUR HERO ZONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN'S RUNNING SIRIUS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Either he knows something we don't or he don't know nothing.

OR: They hired HOWARD'S BABYSITTER.

Posted 4:51 PM by Gene

I am afraid it is not much of a leap, o rare PUBLIC EDITOR of the TRIB, from art in subway tunnels to STEALING MANHOLE COVERS.

Posted 4:46 PM by Gene

The man who took the Newport Cigarettes "swish" and turned it upside down and inspired zillion-dollar contracts to middle-school kids and ghetto youth into killing one another over sneakers, Phil Knight (namesake of Bobby), is stepping aside as CEO. He is being succeeded, fittingly enough, by a man who ran Johnson's Wax, which nearly sponsored a TV show about cross-dressing.

Posted 2:28 PM by Gene

SAMMY! SAMMY GLICKMAN!! Want to increase movie attendance? RUN MORE ADS!!!!!

Posted 1:53 PM by Gene

It poured on the christening of Slick's anonymously-funded mobile home on stilts.

Hope it doesn't float away.

Posted 11:02 AM by Gene

The time has come to retire Nightline and LORD KOPPEL OF ESPNDOM (see second item). Twenty-five years ago the concept of late-night themed news and instant interviews was bold, but cable and the Web superceded the grand idea, and increasingly a very fine reporter compromised himself with guest hosts and prerecording and clever editing; in time he became the PC sage of his business, belching platitudes from a haze atop his home-built Olympus. Let the LORD live out his dotage on his ten-million acre spread, where he can pine over the days when HE, not JON STEWART, was THE SECOND COMING OF MURROW.

Posted 9:50 AM by Gene

Perhaps political diversity makes censorship unworkable. But to throw up our hands and trust in "the off-switch" is to cede society to BIG MEDIA. There has to be a compromise, and it HAS to work. God knows our culture doesn't.

Posted 9:06 AM by Gene

Two things about SAMMY GLICKMAN'S CRACKDOWN:

Piracy of movies is wrong.

Why SAMMY's crusade will go nowhere: You get what you pay for.

Posted 8:13 AM by Gene

LOOK AT ME!!!!! I'M ON CNN!!!!! OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

For the umpteenth time, here is why STERNO is not a credible spokespoop for HIS biz:

1. He's worked for BIG MEDIA all his life;

2. He worked for "TIME INC.", where practically everybody is an ORGANIZATION MAN;

3. He worked for the SISTER FIRM of an ENTERTAINMENT COMPANY, which means it was TO HIS BENEFIT TO OVERPRAISE, AND SUCK UP;

4. He WORKS for SI, who runs VANITY FAIR and GQ, which toady to show biz even more than PEOPLE;

5. He has never stopped saying we're in THE MEGA-PLATINUM AGE OF SHOW-BIZ, partly because he said that as the EDITOR OF EWWWWWWWWWWWWW!! for a dozen years;

6. A BIG-MEDIA TYPE with a BLOG is STILL A BIG-MEDIA TYPE.

7. He's a FANATIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! of HOWARD, and my dictionary defines "fanatic" as "one having excessive zeal for and irrational attachment to a cause or position."

8. I've never seen him on TV, but given the smirky OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO coming from his mouth I'd bet he's SUPER-GLIB, and that alone should open him to suspicion. God knows how much training he got at the mythical TIME INC.!!!!!!!!!!

9. The reason stories like MS. BOOB's are annoying is NOT because of the stories, it's because FIVE BIG MEDIA COMPANIES WITH HALF-A-MILLION OUTLETS POUND THEM TO DEATH -- AND THE WEB ACTS AS A MILLION-WATT AMPLIFIER.

10. He will NOT listen to REASON because he's a BIG MEDIA TYPE -- and further because he can claim he's a VICTIM of 9-11, and has SUFFERED IMMENSELY, and therefore compounding the problem.

That is IT for STERNO. He makes a DENTIST'S DRILL SOOTHING.

Posted 6:46 AM by Gene

A story in full:

Former U-S [sic] President Bill Clinton's library will be officially dedicated today in Little Rock, Arkansas.

Among those who will attend the event will be Robin Williams and Kevin Spacey, as well as former presidents Jimmy Carter and George Bush Senior.

The Clinton library features a full-scale replica of the Oval Office, and a display on the Whitewater and Monica Lewinsky scandals.

Yep, it's all about COMEDY.

Posted 6:27 PM by Gene

LITTLE AND POWER LINE FIND SARIN IN IRAQ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
No they don't.

Posted 6:21 PM by Gene

Democratic Party leaders said Wednesday they want to know why Sen. John Kerry ended his presidential campaign with more than $15 million in the bank, money that could have helped Democratic candidates across the country.

Maybe he promised it to Te-RRRRRRRRRRRRRAIT-TZA.

Posted 5:01 PM by Gene

A sheaf of EXCITING FORWARD-LOOKING NEWS in the THEA-TAH:

Re-Makin' Whoopi: Revising Characters and Scenes After 20 Years, Goldberg Opens on Bway Nov. 17

...a show that first opened in 1984!

Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick Odd Couple Aiming at August 2005 Broadway Opening

...a show that first opened in 1965!!

AND, last but NOT LEAST:

Hal Holbrook's Mark Twain Tonight to Return to Broadway in 2005

...a show that first opened in 1959!! WOW!!!!!

And no, we have not forgotten the 71-year-old Kennedy Center honoree CHITA RIVERA!

Posted 3:20 PM by Gene

Remember that British egghead medical review that ran a "study" claiming WE (or somebody) killed 2,000,000 Iraqis (or whatever the number was)? WELL, some "ALTERNATIVE" RAG (peeeeeeeeeee-U!) runs a story with this little sentence:

With both the liberal Brookings Institution and the anti-war Human Rights Watch apparently dismissing the Lancet study as incredible, most observers felt no need to read the study itself.

But the story goes on for another 300 paragraphs, presumably to prove the liberal Brookings Institution and the anti-war Human Rights Watch somehow WRONG. But in the face of such a definitive judgment we can only conclude yet another hack loves the taste of FOOT-IN-MOUTH.

THANKS, Romy, for another SCINTILLATING LINK!!!!!

Posted 1:52 PM by Gene

Nashville Rapper Sought For Vibe Award Stabbing

Another [C]RAPPER makes a brilliant career move.

Does he [C]RAP with a cowboy hat and a southern accent?

Posted 10:28 AM by Gene

Even if SNIDELY WHIPLASH is found INNOCENT does not mean he will be found HONEST.

Posted 10:11 AM by Gene

Sighhhhhhhhhhhhhh, I wouldn't be surprised if ESPNCorp and the TAGLIAFOOL DID write their apologies IN ADVANCE.

Posted 9:31 AM by Gene

An excellent question for Condo -- from GEORGE WILL, for once:

If you had been secretary in 1991, would you have advocated regime change -- driving on to Baghdad?

Posted 9:16 AM by Gene

Nearly 800,000 Bowflex machines recalled

TRANSLATION: Nearly 800,000 coat hangers recalled.

Posted 9:02 AM by Gene

And today, in loving tribute, we shall call STERNO THE REED IRVINE OF NEWHOUSE.

Posted 8:52 AM by Gene

The professional crank Reed Irvine, who helped invent such words as "ombudsman" and Brent Bozell, has died, and it is quite fitting that the MMMMMMMMMM-SSSSSSSSSS-MMMMMMMMMM don't have ONE WORD ON IT.

Ben Bradlee's kicking up his heels.

Posted 8:48 AM by Gene

One of America's most liberal newspapers warns of...

A DANGER OF GROUPTHINK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

THEIR groupthink. (Ours is okay, especially when we write editorials.)

Posted 8:31 AM by Gene

A couple of Variety flacks scratch their heads over why most movies last a third of a weekend, and one of them comes up with this brilliant observation:

"Why do 50 million people watch The Apprentice? Because they all think it's an amazing show?....You don't want to be the one clueless person who didn't see Spider-Man."

And there's the problem -- in VARIETYWORLD, a person who doesn't see Spider-Man IS CLUELESS.

He concludes with this equally brilliant observation:

"Joseph Levine said, 'If the budget is big enough and the advertising is right, you can fool everybody.' And that's really what they've always been trying to do."

Yes you have.

Posted 6:57 AM by Gene

Did you know Christopher Buckley wrote a novel that "combined elements of the O.J. trial and the Clinton marriage"? Did you know it won "the ninth annual Thurber Prize"? WOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWW!!!!!

I think POWER may be trying to -- branch out. Really, the SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGERS should stick to what they know best: nothing.

P. S. I once saw this satirical genius on C-SPAN delivering a speech. From his demeanor he must have FORTIFIED himself for it. I guess that's what comes from being BILL BUCKLEY'S -- SON, bzumbzumbzumbzum.

Posted 6:41 AM by Gene

SUMNER's latest money-making scheme: an all-black Honeymooners movie.

Here's predicting the ad-blurb copywriters call it a SITCOM.

YOU'RE GOING TO THE MOON, SUMNER!

P. S. THE PAPER OF RE-CORD does not disclose who made the film (that requires a few mouse clicks), so SUMNER may ALREADY be hedging his bet. (Or rather his BET -- as in BOOGIE EVERYNIGHT TELEVISION.)

Posted 6:26 AM by Gene

Another feather in R. Kelly's cap: Gary Sheffield's wife.

I BELIEVE YOU SHOULD FLYYYYYY-YYYYYY-YYYYYY-YYYYYY-YYYYYY-YYYYYY-YYYYYY-YYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted 6:23 AM by Gene

Kmart Holding Corporation and Sears, Roebuck and Co. Agree To Merge

TRANSLATION: Misery loves companies.

Posted 7:01 PM by Gene

Sure that color's becoming?

Posted 6:55 PM by Gene

As Yasser must surely know by now, YOU CAN'T TAKE IT WITH YOU.

Still he seems to have left his wife quite a -- HERITAGE.

Does the Koran say anything about Swiss bank accounts?

Posted 6:45 PM by Gene

Meantime, the League of Vastly-Overpaid Sphere-Throwing Fully-Tattooed ATTITUDE PHREAKS worries about important things -- like IPODS.

Posted 6:25 PM by Gene

ESPNCORP APOLOGIZED.

Leaving aside the sheer megatonnage of STUPIDITY in running such a stunt days after THE CASTOR OIL AFFAIR, who could have figured this would be more than a cheesy promo in a forgettable game, of interest solely to the teams' respective fans? But then came SUMNER and MS. BOOB. And this isn't just the boonies talking, or the mere matter of a towel. Given the NFL's reaction Broadcasting and Cable says in a handful of words this may be the push that shoves the MNF package out of ESPNCorp. LAST NIGHT'S RATINGS DID NOT HELP. Well, goodbye and get lost.

And THANKS AGAIN, G000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000GLEBLOGGER, for BEING DOWN NEARLY AN HOUR when I WANTED TO POST THIS.

P. S. Then again Commish Tagliafool just got a neat deal from SUM and MR. MOONER, so he may not feel like criticizing TOO much.

P. P. S. "I think ABC Sports should be absolutely, positively ashamed of itself for the opening to Monday Night Football," says Peter King of SI.

(Oh well, those girls merely pose.)

Posted 5:27 PM by Gene

News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch on Tuesday said he can live with Liberty Media Corp. being a large shareholder of the media conglomerate if Liberty Chairman John Malone signs a pact preventing his company from raising its stake.

THE HITLER-STALIN PACT, REDUX.

Posted 5:09 PM by Gene

Dubya seems to think of education as his legacy. With no disrespect to the president, we argue IGNORAMUSES are more likely to be OURS.

Posted 5:01 PM by Gene

HED OF THE WEEK, from PRNEWSWIRE:

Ohio Man Breaks National All-Time Record for Cash-In of Largest Collection of Pennies, With Final Count Reaching 1,048,013 Weighing in at 3.5 Tons and Valued at $10,480.13

His name wouldn't be Frank WIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIILDHORN, would it?

Sadly, no:

Coinstar, Inc. (Nasdaq: CSTR) announced today that 78-year-old Eugene J. Sukie, a retired glass plant worker/supervisor from Barberton, Ohio broke a national all-time record, along with the company's standing record for the most pennies collected and cashed-in at a Coinstar machine by a single customer. Sukie, who celebrates his 79th birthday later this month, and his wife...

...who promptly got a divorce....

BOOOOOOOOOOOOO!! BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Posted 4:56 PM by Gene

In more great news about the thea-TAH, Frank WIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIILDHORN is inflicting it with a show about SCOTT and ZELDA!

I've got a better title, WIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIILDMAN: The Beautiful and Damned.

Meantime THE PAPER OF RE-CORD says EVE's new show isn't as good as the old as she spends too much time staring at "her -- BELLY BUTTON."

EXCELSIOOOOOOOOOOOOOR!!!!!

Posted 4:48 PM by Gene

Ivory Coast Hate Broadcasts Have Ended, U.N. Says

So why can't it stop THE OSAMA CHANNEL?

Posted 4:46 PM by Gene

Actual hed from G000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000gle News:

Computer Screens Might Make You Blind
LinuxInsider.com

That and something they're closely related to.

Posted 2:33 PM by Gene

FLASH! THE OSAMA CHANNEL RESPECTS THE AUDIENCE'S FEELINGS!!!!!

Pffh-hh-hh hh hh hh hh ha ha ha ha ha ha HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!

Posted 1:38 PM by Gene

Could NHLitis slowly be spreading to FOOTBALL?

P. S. to MICKEYMOUSE NIXON and TEENY TINY BOBBY: Given how the ratings fizzled I'd guess salaciousness may not sell.

Posted 1:24 PM by Gene

THE TERRIBLE-TEMPERED MR. BANG WANTS BILL SAFIRE'S JOB!!!!!

1. Hey STERNO, do you REALLY want to be a token conservative?

2. What's wrong with BLOGGING?????

3. How many people want to read 700-word tantrums?

4. Whatsa matter, Nick Dorken ain't workin' out?

It's official: STERNO is the MR. MARK of BLOGGING.

Posted 1:19 PM by Gene

Please, pretty please, halt the violence -- in English.

Posted 1:10 PM by Gene

Dancin' on the ceiling at The OSAMA CHANNEL again!

Do they get an extra 72 virgins every time they celebrate?

Posted 11:02 AM by Gene

While many professors are phasing pop culture into their courses, it's not a novel idea, says Tim Massie, who teaches "Varieties of Religious Experience: The Church in Rome" at Marist College in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. "Look at Cecil B. DeMille's version of 'The Ten Commandments' with Charlton Heston. How many families had their kids sit around the TV, to watch not just the movie, but perhaps learn more about their faith?"

The approach goes back to the 1960s, says Paul Giurlanda, chair of religious studies at St. Mary's College in Moraga, Calif. "Except then it was Simon and Garfunkel," he says. "The drawback? It's easy to get youth culture wrong. I can remember several student retreats where 'hip' high school teachers at Catholic schools were playing 'Sounds of Silence' and not realizing that the students were so past that song. If you're going to ride this wave, you'd better be on top of it, and not a little bit behind it."

TRANSLATION: College will always be about HIP!, WITH-IT!!, NOW!!! and wrong.

Posted 6:45 AM by Gene

Washington's BASEBALL-MAD MAYOR goes Ka-CHING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted 6:40 AM by Gene

THE MIRACLE ABORTION PILL!!!!!!!!!! takes a life.

When do the hacks start complaining of RIGHTS?

Posted 6:33 AM by Gene

DUBYA DOUBLE-FOLLOWED MY ADVICE!

From now on to prevent spelling errors we'll call her "Condo."

Posted 6:28 AM by Gene

DUBYA FOLLOWED MY ADVICE!

If only. But SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGERS would tout it all the way from here until the software preserving their brilliance is obsolete.

Posted 6:24 AM by Gene

A hip-hop music awards ceremony in Santa Monica erupted in chaos Monday night after rap pioneer Dr. Dre, awaiting a lifetime achievement award, apparently was punched in the face and his bodyguards set upon the attacker.

The second annual Vibe awards presentations were halted as police swarmed the hangar at Santa Monica Airport, where about 1,000 people were attending the show. Santa Monica police summoned reinforcements from neighboring law enforcement agencies.

In the chaos, a man was stabbed, police said. The victim, identified by police only as a 26-year-old Los Angeles resident, was in stable condition at a hospital.

Another [C]RAPPER makes a BRILLIANT career move.

AND SUMNER TAPED IT!!!!!

Posted 7:56 PM by Gene

Mr. Keillor was TRYING to be funny, something that would escape the deadly humorless typist-copyists at WorldNetDaily (one of whom was so incensed as to type "there" for "their"); on the other hand, with liberals continuing in their deep blue-country funk, there may be, in the back of this attempt at laughter, a bit of bigoted seriousness.

Posted 5:29 PM by Gene

Someone had better tell Interscope that the record business has changed.

Someone tells the record biz?

Posted 5:27 PM by Gene

The Pentagon has agreed to warn military bases worldwide that they should not directly sponsor Boy Scout troops, partially resolving claims that the government has improperly supported a group that requires members to believe in God.

Whatcha gonna do about THOSE values, Dubya?

Posted 5:24 PM by Gene

Take a bow, LAND OF FRUITS AND NUTS:

California Leads the Nation in Auto Theft Rates for 2003

Posted 5:12 PM by Gene

I can think of reasons to boo "Dr." Dobson, but my reasons wouldn't be Toenail.com's reasons, and Toenail.com's reasons wouldn't be good ones (not the least because they'd be cribbed from THE PAPER OF RE-CORD and the other folk who believe in POOR EASILY-LED CHRISTIANS).

Posted 4:55 PM by Gene

On my weekday sojourn to work I pass a ticket agency. Looking at the acts -- WWE RAW!!!!! NEMO ON ICE!!!!! -- I thought, has the NHL lockout (NHL? What's an NHL?) hurt other overpriced attractions? It must send a signal: who wants to spend $200 on no-talents or hoodlums with AAAAAAATTITUUUUUUUUUDE!!!!! (and sometimes both) ? Our local NBA mediocrity the 76ers is doing a dollars-off tray-liner stunt at Mickey D's -- and they STILL CHARGE TOO MUCH. If we can live without the goons why can't we live without the tattooed girlie-men of b-ball, or the whining rock nobodies, or the fake circuses and Ice Follies? Why must we waste our money on fifth-rate arena show biz?

Speaking thereof, the bus-and-truck company of Thoroughly Modern Millie now parked at the Academy of Music Gas-'n'-Go Truck Stop has painted a logo on its big rig. WOOOOOOOWWWWWWW!!!!! I'd bet one in a thousand can name the people who wrote its "songs." (No, Cahn and Van Heusen DON'T COUNT.)

Posted 2:43 PM by Gene

I've been continuing my search for an HDTV set -- I've narrowed it down to three models, all Sonys, and have ditched the thought of analog -- and was more than a little frazzled to learn that on certain Sony models some people insist they can see a faint vertical bar moving across the screen in HD; the company ended up putting out a service bulletin. But as one poster put it, "[I]t is pretty easy to drive yourself crazy looking for little defects."

Which brings me to REV. WILDMON. He could see a beautiful pastoral scene and if he thought he heard the F-word, he'd write to the FCC -- never mind if he was sitting outdoors. Or more to the point, if he'd served on D-Day he'd have brought a whole company before Ike for CURSING.

And as I said, one should not associate COMMON SENSE with REV. WILDMON.

Sorry, TWO WRONGS DON'T MAKE A RIGHT, STERNO. You're just on the other side of the same leaky S. S. MINNOW.

Posted 1:27 PM by Gene

Safire to Step Down as Times Columnist

There goes the token conservative.

Posted 9:49 AM by Gene

GENERAL'S QUIT. Who's the next appeaser?

Doesn't help though now that Yasser's gone.

P. S. So's the guy who looks like a corner butcher and runs the Education Department of Fossil Fuels. "Howya want that cut of gasoline, ma'am?"

P. P. S. Didn't GENERAL just win Dubya the election?

Posted 9:12 AM by Gene

All of Hollywood is tied in knots because movies are SO GOOD this year a feature-length cartoon may win the best-picture Oscar®!

So what? A cartoon won last year.

Posted 8:38 AM by Gene

We're still going to stick with STERNO, but eventually we'll have to come up with a better nickname. Maybe we'll even call it EXCLUSIVE! How about --

THE TERRIBLE-TEMPERED MR. BANG!!!!!!!!!!